FA - The Duncan Leading Indicator (Demand)

The Duncan Leading Indicator is a respected and accurate leading indicator pointing to potential downturns anywhere between 1 to 4 years before the downturn materialises. It's more of an economic gauge of the longer term momentum trend in the economy. This Indicator identifies sectors of the economy with consistently cyclical behaviour and tracks the movement of these sectors relative to other sectors to identify where we are in the current business cycle and therefore can help to identify downturns before they happen: -

… it is possible to refine the DLI to track only the more sensitive leading indicator sub sectors. So for example in the Non-residential sector, only the Business Equipment Investment sub-sector is a real leading indicator… 

(This 2021 peak in the DLI is about the same length of time it peaked before the GFC crisis in 2008, and the 1990 recession.)